Saint Mary's Beacon

THE RAPID GROWTH OF LONDON

An English paper asks the significant question, "How long will London be habitable?" The enormous town is increasing so rapidly as to threaten to seriously interfere with the comforts of its inhabitants. Already the prevalence of a south-east wind bears to the vicinity of the parks the dense canopy of smoke and the vitiated atmosphere of nine miles of buildings. As the circumference of the vast city is extended, this evil is exaggerated with each annual addition to the space built over. The slight re- cubic feet of carbonic acid gas are expired in London in the course of twenty-four hours by human beings alone. This is irrespective of smoke, of the gaseous products of combustion, and of all other sources whereby the air is vitiated. This quantity of carbonic acid renders twenty times its weight of atmospheric air unfit for the support of life. On a perfectly calm day, when the respiration of London hangs within the limits of the metropolitan districts, the polluted atmosphere, were it possible to press it down upon the streets, would fill the whole roadway to a depth of between eight and nine feet. This startling quantity of poisoned air London must daily exchange for fresh. As to smoke, it may be mentioned that on an average 14,000 tons of coal are daily used in the capital, a great portion of which is cast into the atmosphere in the partially volatilized form of smoke. The increasing difficulty of living in London during the summer becomes every year more oppressive, and there can be no question that the actual experiment of how large a city can be made will not require many more years to solve.